'Donald Trump LOST IT': Combative Trump STORMS out of interview after called out for election lies

[0:00] Donald Trump lost it on national television this weekend and proved to anyone watching that he has absolutely no way to defend his big, ugly lie. [0:10] You know, the one he returns to any time he's faced with a question that he can't answer. [0:14] Before storming off an interview with NBC's Meet the Press, a combative Donald Trump was unable to answer questions about the war in Iran, the war he started, or the dire economic conditions American farmers are facing due to his tariffs. [0:30] Or whether his deeply unpopular $1.8 billion slush fund is, in fact, dead. [0:36] Instead, he retreated to familiar territory, lies about the 2020 election and the integrity of America's election systems writ large. [0:44] Pulling out the January 6th playbook to cast doubts on the results of Los Angeles mayoral primary. [0:50] Trump is trying to spin California's standard lengthy ballot counting timeline to cast doubts on the integrity of the vote. [0:56] As a reality TV star he endorsed appears unlikely to make it to the runoff, giving us an alarming preview of what we can expect come November's midterms in the process. [1:07] Watch. [1:08] They sent people to jail who did nothing wrong. [1:12] Just to be very clear, there's no evidence of what you're saying. [1:15] But let me ask you about Todd Blanch. [1:17] Let me ask you about Todd Blanch. [1:17] Listen to me. [1:18] Listen to me. [1:19] Let's talk about Todd Blanch. [1:20] There's tremendous evidence. [1:21] There's nothing but evidence. [1:22] The election was rigged. [1:24] It was a dirty election and it's happening again right now in California. [1:28] You never presented evidence that the 2020 election was rigged. [1:32] Right now, look at what's happening in California. [1:34] Where's the evidence to that? [1:35] It's four days. [1:36] The Republicans are doing well in California. [1:38] In California, it's... [1:39] No, they're not. [1:40] They're dropping fast because it's a rigged election. [1:42] Let me tell you. [1:43] It's four days and they aren't even close to coming up with... [1:47] That's how they capped the votes in California. [1:48] You know why they're doing that? [1:49] Because they're cheating on the election. [1:50] Do you have evidence to support that? [1:53] All I have to do is look. [1:54] All I have to do is look. [1:55] That's not evidence. [1:55] And I listen. [1:56] And I listen to people and let's see what happens. [1:59] But, sir, that's not evidence. [2:00] Do you think it's appropriate... [2:00] That's how they count the votes in California. [2:02] Do you think it's appropriate that they have an election and five days later they're nowhere [2:07] close to picking one... [2:08] State and local officials acknowledge they are slow. [2:11] They're urging... [2:11] No, they're crooked. [2:12] They're crooked. [2:12] They're urging the votes to be counted quickly. [2:14] That's how they vote in California. [2:15] They're crooked. [2:15] Just like you're crooked. [2:16] Your press is crooked. [2:18] And meet the press is crooked. [2:19] To be fair, I'm not crooked. [2:20] But let's continue. [2:21] Really? [2:21] Well, you play right into their hands. [2:23] Let's continue. [2:23] You're either crooked or you're stupid. [2:25] Let's continue. [2:25] You play right into their hands with this rep. [2:27] You know that these elections are rigged. [2:31] Your network knows that they're rigged. [2:34] You know that I won an election in a landslide and I got 94% bad press. [2:40] But, Mr. President... [2:41] You know why I got that? [2:41] You've never presented evidence. [2:42] Because you have no credibility. [2:43] But you've never presented evidence that it was rigged. [2:45] Let's keep talking about... [2:46] I want to talk about Todd Pritch. [2:47] You have more evidence. [2:48] There's more evidence than ever presented. [2:52] Let's talk about... [2:52] Your elections in this country... [2:54] You went to court... [2:54] We're like a third world country. [2:56] But, sir... [2:56] Your elections are crooked. [2:58] And you're crooked. [2:59] And meet the press is crooked. [3:00] But, Mr. President... [3:00] And so is ABC and CBS and CNN. [3:04] But, Mr. President... [3:05] You're one-sided crooked networks. [3:07] Let's call it quits because I've had enough. [3:09] Thank you, darling. [3:10] Have a good time. [3:10] That warning that Donald Trump is still set on undermining our democracy is where we begin [3:18] today with voting rights attorney and founder of Democracy Docket, Mark Elias. [3:21] And with me at the table for the hour, writer and editor for Protect Democracy, Amanda Carpenter. [3:27] I cannot imagine two better people to have this conversation with. [3:30] Mark Elias, before we get to all the evidence that he cannot show us, despite his ability to [3:36] send some staffer to Kinko's to print out beautiful images of the bunker that he is currently [3:41] building akin to the White House, tell me, what does it mean for democracy to have a [3:48] president of the United States continue a years, nearly decades-long lie that our fundamental [3:57] right to vote is not, in fact, fair and free? [4:02] Yeah. [4:02] I mean, it goes back even further than that. [4:04] I mean, Donald Trump, in 2012, the night that Barack Obama won re-election, he was posting [4:09] lies about the elections. [4:11] But you're right. [4:12] Since he became a candidate, since 2016, when he defeated Hillary Clinton, he has been lying [4:19] about voting. [4:20] He's been lying about elections. [4:21] He's been lying about election results. [4:23] I mean, he lied about the election results in California following the 2016 election. [4:28] And he has been lying about elections ever since. [4:31] And the problem is that as much as you and I and Amanda can push back on this, and as much [4:39] as we can defeat him in court and we can explain the truth, it is wearing down our democracy. [4:45] It is wearing down our institutions. [4:47] It's wearing down our guardrails. [4:49] It is wearing down the people like us who, you know, frankly, get exhausted at pushing [4:55] back on this. [4:56] It is wearing down the election officials who are right now trying to count ballots in California [5:02] and are being attacked. [5:04] And so, you know, we have to we have to steel ourselves for this. [5:08] But we also have to understand that it does take a toll. [5:11] It does take its price on democracy. [5:13] Your last democracy docket post was about hope. [5:17] So I am not listening to you for a second when you tell me that you of all people are [5:21] worn down, Mark Elias. [5:23] Isn't it interesting to you that he hasn't even come up with something to fill the void [5:28] when he's asked for evidence? [5:30] I mean, there's not even at this point, Mark, like a knee jerk reaction to point to something [5:35] or anything. [5:35] We're just supposed to be taking him at his word. [5:38] And I understand that's because no such evidence exists. [5:41] But I wonder at this point, Mark, who's buying it? [5:43] Yeah, you're exactly right, by the way. [5:45] And you're right. [5:46] I did write today for Democracy, talking about the importance of hope. [5:49] And we all need to have hope, right? [5:50] Like there's a there's we can both be be sort of weary of it, but but also say we're not [5:56] going to give into it and say that we're not going to become hopeless about it. [5:59] And we're not going to let him win by by losing faith in our ability to fight back. [6:03] I think that Donald Trump's attack on California has two particular aspects to it. [6:07] The first is that he cannot stand the fact that the people of California cannot stand him. [6:11] I mean, they keep voting against him. [6:13] They keep succeeding as an economy. [6:16] And and he can't stand that. [6:18] The second, though, is that if if he wants to steal the 2026 election, if he wants to [6:22] subvert the outcome, you know, like Willie Sutton went to banks because that's where the [6:26] money was. [6:27] He's going to California because that's where the seats are. [6:29] And so if he wants to if he wants to, you know, steal eight seats, 10 seats or call a [6:33] question, you know, that's where he needs to go. [6:36] But he doesn't have any evidence. [6:37] And this is your point. [6:38] By the way, you know, one thing I'd add is that you'd think if you were going to steal [6:43] elections and you were the state of California, like you wouldn't take your time, right? [6:48] You'd be able to do it right away because after all, you'd be stealing the outcome of the [6:51] election. [6:52] The fact that these election officials are day in, day out, you know, toiling in public [6:56] in with full transparency, trying to get it 100 percent right is is actually the opposite [7:02] of what you would expect if you were trying to do something untoward. [7:08] Amanda, I was struck by the fact that the first assistant U.S. attorney in California [7:12] who came out with the statement alleging that there was potential fraud that they were going [7:16] to investigate because he is carrying Donald Trump's water says the reason I believe there's [7:22] the possibility of fraud is because California doesn't require I.D. [7:26] and because we have this vast system of mail-in voting. [7:29] So I went over to the Internet, which is available to almost all and Googled, you know, what is [7:34] the cases of voter fraud when it comes to mail-in voting? [7:36] According to Brookings, it's 0.00004 percent, right? [7:41] Like we're not talking about a thing that is real. [7:44] Why this particular interest in sowing doubt in mail-in voting? [7:48] Yeah, because mail-in voting is where they think they can exercise some control. [7:52] I mean, look at what happened in this interview. [7:54] Does Donald Trump actually care about the L.A. mayor's race? [7:57] Do they actually care about boosting reality TV stars have to stick together, Amanda? [8:02] Who was slinging, you know, crystals on the Internet five minutes ago. [8:05] What they're interested in is continuing this conspiracy about mail-in ballots so that they [8:11] can have people in place like Todd Blanche or Bill Pute so that they can launch these fake [8:17] investigations to disrupt the process and deny results that they don't like. [8:21] This is you were right. [8:22] This is absolutely about spreading lies about the mail-in voting process because you look [8:28] what the U.S. Postal Service of all places a couple of weeks ago, they proposed a rule [8:33] so that they would create a national mail-in voter database so that Trump appointees could [8:39] disqualify people from the voter rolls. They want to nationalize mail-in voting so that they [8:44] can take it over. That's what's happening behind the scenes here. In front, we see Donald Trump [8:49] melting down, saying the same stuff he's been saying, as Mark pointed out, for the last decade. [8:54] But behind the scenes, they're putting things in place to deceive people about mail-in voting, [9:00] to disrupt the process and deny the results with these loyalists that they put into place. [9:04] Let's talk about some of those loyalists. I want to play you both. These are the legal [9:08] advisors who were surrounding Trump back in 2020, as opposed to the legal advisors who [9:13] are surrounding him now. Take a look. [9:16] I made it clear I did not agree with the idea of saying the election was stolen and putting out [9:21] this stuff, which I told the president was bullshit. And I didn't want to be a part of it. And that's [9:29] one of the reasons that went into me deciding to leave when I did. I observed, I think it was on [9:36] December 1st, that you can't live in a world where the incumbent administration stays in power [9:42] based on its view, unsupported by specific evidence, that there was fraud in the election. [9:50] On the integrity side, we're doing an absolutely terrible job. And the American people are right [9:57] to question it. [9:57] California's election law allows ballots, those who are by election day, to be counted [10:02] and permit same-day registration. That means tabulation typically continues for weeks. [10:08] And that doesn't sound like fraud. You can argue whether the law makes sense, [10:12] but that doesn't sound like a fraudulent situation. [10:14] No, there's a great phrase, opportunity for fraud. [10:17] Mark Elias, talk to me about the, quote, opportunity for fraud and the way that idea [10:24] is perpetuated when it's not just the president of the United States who is saying it, but all [10:28] of the lackeys around him. [10:31] I just ask the question, why the hell is the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New [10:35] York opining on election law in California? I mean, doesn't he have enough to do in Manhattan? [10:42] Maybe he should lock up some Wall Street criminals? Instead, he's sitting there, you know, [10:47] talking about opportunities for fraud in California. And by the way, his job is to [10:54] investigate crimes based on evidence and to bring charges where they exist, not to be a roving [11:03] political reporter about opportunities for fraud under election laws he knows literally nothing [11:09] about. I mean, the fact that this is what the U.S. attorney's office in New York is talking about [11:15] tells you everything you need to know about the corruption of this Department of Justice, [11:20] because this guy knows that his bread is buttered by having something provocative to say [11:26] when dear leader is watching TV, even though he's sitting in a studio in New York City [11:32] and opining about California election law. It's a bunch of nonsense. There's no opportunity for [11:39] fraud because people are validating ballots in public. There's no opportunity for fraud because [11:46] the U.S. Postal Service is too slow in delivering the mail. It is an insult to voters. It is an affront [11:53] to democracy. And it is part and parcel of what is wrong with this administration, that this guy who's [12:01] supposed to be tracking down terrorism or Wall Street criminals is instead doing Donald Trump's bidding [12:08] by insinuating nonsense about California.